Thursday, February 23, 2017

Thu Feb 23rd Todays News

Dan Andrews is the Premier of Victoria. Today I heard his sales pitch for the next election. "Vote for Dan Andrews. He can't help." "Give your support to Dan Andrews. It won't help you, but it is good to help the needy." Victoria have ordered water from a mothballed desalination plant. Victoria does not need that water, as the Dam supply is good. We pipe water from farmland to Melbourne, but can't send it back when we are abundant. In order to power the desalination plant, diesel fuel generators are needed because rats ate through the power grid for the mothballed plant. It is an environmental nightmare costing approximately $19 billion over its expected lifetime. The plant has never produced water but to keep mothballed it costs $605 million a year. What will Dan Andrews do to fix the problem? I am reading a research article by Matthew C. MacWilliams , University of Massachusetts Amherst, a PhD student. The article was popular among #FakeNewsMedia. Matthew writes

"Building on these theories of authoritarian behavior, activation, and authoritarianism’s role in partisan polarization, I developed two, codependent theories to explain Trump’s domination of the Republican nominating process. First, I hypothesize (H1) that Trump’s authoritarian message and manner rallied authoritarian voters to his us-versus-them banner. The slow but steady move- ment of authoritarians into the Republican Party demonstrated by Hetherington and Weiler (2009) created a tipping point in 2016 (a large enough cadre of authoritarian voters within the Republican primary electorate) for a candidate with an authoritarian message like Trump’s not only to emerge but, because party insiders abrogated their leadership role, to win."

GOP insiders wanted to win, and tried. Even after Trump won, there were moves made to prevent Trump from being anointed. They were fruitless. Trump won because he was the best candidate. He had the best plan for restoring US greatness. He had support of grassroots (Tea Party) and non conservatives who could no longer stomach Democrat corruption. But Matthew still posits his hypotheses. Matthew seems to have abrogated his responsibility to be impartial, and observe. In 2015, I wrote Turnbull should resign as he had nothing left to offer, except damaging Liberal governments. Today, Turnbull has proved me right. At the moment, Turnbull is being lauded by the partisan media for insulting Bill Shorten, the ALP leader. A real Liberal leader would not insult Shorten, but point to his failed policy record. Turnbull still has the support of Miranda Devine. But non partisan conservative commentators say that Abbott is the best alternative. Meanwhile, I am hostage to abysmal political leadership and hopeless journalists. My shopfront has opened on Facebook.I am very good and don't deserve the abuse given me. I created a video raising awareness of anti police feeling among western communities. I chose the senseless killing of Nicola Cotton, a Louisiana policewoman who joined post Katrina, to highlight the issue. I did this in order to get an income after having been illegally blacklisted from work in NSW for being a whistleblower. I have not done anything wrong. Local council appointees refused to endorse my work, so I did it for free. Youtube's Adsence refused to allow me to profit from their marketing it. Here is a video I made Fat Old Hugh Grant He never says anything, but he says it all

David Ball10 years ago
Yep there is a point. It is a mimic of Hugh Grant's on screen work .. he talks around the point and, endearingly, never gets to it. You'll notice this if you look at any of his films .. he is a genius. Sorry I'm not, but this is also a joke ;)

=== from 2016 ===

Not written as I was working to secure accommodation.

=== from 2015 ===

Shorten wastes question time with lies about military arrangements and submarines. A partisan press is inflating leaked information from cabinet with opportunist assertions from the opposition to destabilise the government and weaken the NSW Government's case for re election. Both NSW and Australia's governments are producing effective and responsible measures for both the state and the federation. The opposition is embarrassingly bad, but the press refuse to notice. In the case of the ABC their partisan stance is illegal. Sports Cocaine ring? Or recreational abuse? The liars who promoted the ASADA inquiry into sport would like it that sports people were part of a wide spread ring. The reality is it is probably a personal choice thing involving too much money for young athletes with no direction in their lives beyond winning games on grass. Cambodian deal to facilitate transfer of refugees from Nauru to Cambodia. The international Organisation for Migration has agreed to administrate the transfers. The deal will give the potential of refugees being settled in Cambodia and giving them citizenship. HRCS was wrong to say last week that it was a bad deal that would not be finalised, as it has been.

On this day in 303, Diocletian began a persecution of Christians with orders for the destruction of the Christian church in Nicomedia. Diocletian's tomb was later turned into what it is today, a Christian Church. In 532, Justinian I ordered the construction of the Hagia Sophia which would become the largest cathedral in the world for a thousand years, changing the way architecture developed. It was then converted into a Mosque before becoming a museum in the 1930's. It is the third most visited museum in Turkey today, with 3.3 million visitors annually. In 1455, as noted last year, the Gutenberg Bible was printed with movable type. Ten years ago, it was a primary school art task to make Lino Prints with linoleum blocks. Today OHS rules prevent it. In 1739, a former school teacher of Richard Palmer identified him at York Castle as being Dick Turpin, the outlaw. He was executed on April 7th. A hundred years later, the writer William Harrison Ainsworth romanticised his exploits. In 1820, a communist style uprising, predating the manifesto, was prevented by London Police arresting the Cato Street Conspirators. The conspiracy was to murder the government ministry and create a committee of public safety as the French Revolutionaries had thirty years earlier. It failed partly because the second in command was a police informer. Of thirteen arrested, five were executed and five were sent to Australia. In 1836, the ill fated Alamo defence began. In 1847, future Texas President Taylor defeated Mexico's Santa Anna. In 1861, President Elect Lincoln made it to Washington DC after narrowly avoiding an assassination attempt. Freedom is essential for progress. The IPA (Institute for Public Affairs) is a defender of the freedom of speech in Australia. Section 18c of the racism code is inappropriate and not commensurate with free speech. The ALP does not want free speech, and government attempts to legislate for it have failed. However, security in the war against jihadist terrorists is essential. Surely the ALP would support legislation which will improve safety for Australians even if it is opposed by the IPA? Press freedom is something which came into sharp relief when, in 1898, Emilie Zola, a celebrated writer, was arrested for writing a defence of a Jewish man, Alfred Dreyfus, who was abused by government bigots in France. But Australia's press are so partisan, and incapable of even defending free speech which supports them, that the issue is lost when it doesn't support the ALP.

From 2014

The Ukrainian President had worked closely with Russia, which makes sense, as their opponents, celebrated media endorsed leftists willing to use violence to achieve their ends, have been antagonistic to Russia. Ordinary Ukrainians suffer from left wing's bad decision making. People are dead, The scene has not played out completely. The only certainty is that the left has not been responsible. Now look at the bye election result against the LNP in Redcliffe. The media endorsed an ALP line and the ALP won. It illustrates the impressiveness of the Griffith swing to Liberals. But the cheerleaders for the ALP won't analyse that factoid. Maybe Manus will be closed as it is no longer needed?I love books. Today is the anniversary of the publication of the first Gutenberg Bible. Anyone who does not read books is restricted to living only one life. Humble in aspect, the vellum copies were made with loving care. They predate the knowledge revolution, because they began it. It is possible to collect all the written work around the world made before this book on a single CD. As of 1972, there were a thousand non fiction books printed in the US every day. I had a library I valued at $50k. I intended to give it to the next generation, but I had to give it away to several different charities. None wanted it. Time marches on. Now, I have a Kindle ..

This column welcomes feedback and criticism. The column is not made up but based on the days events and articles which are then placed in the feed. So they may not have an apparent cohesion they would have had were they made up.

===

I am publishing a book called Bread of Life: January.

Bread of Life is a daily bible quote with a layman's understanding of the meaning. I give one quote for each day, and also a series of personal stories illustrating key concepts eg Who is God? What is a miracle? Why is there tragedy?

January is the first of the anticipated year-long work of thirteen books. One for each month and the whole year. It costs to publish. It (Kindle version) should retail at about $2US online, but the paperback version would cost more, according to production cost.If you have a heart for giving, I fundraise at gofund.me/27tkwuc

Bishop said yes to scarf. Marine says "non"

When our foreign minister, Julie Bishop, visited Iran she put a scarf over her head. But when Marine Le Pen, leader of France's National Front, visited the Grand Mufti of Lebanon this week she walked out rather than submit. See her go.

Dr. Binoy Kampmark teaches core legal courses within the Legal and Dispute Studies program for the Bachelor of Social Science at RMIT University. He has research interests in the institution of war, diplomacy, international relations, 20th century history and law. He has written extensively on these topics in both refereed journals and more popular media.

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott is ... stomping and punching his way into the history books ... His foreign policy has entered the comic books ... misguided perceptions of world power ... his seemingly rehearsed idiocy ... His dangerous union with Peta Credlin, his tyrannical bully of a chief of staff ... a leader who has gone beyond the pale ... brash ... distant ... his failure to digest and synthesise the complex world around him ... his own unchanging sense of where women relate in his disjointed cosmos ... his removal is required to save the state ... a fantasist-in-chief ... a self-appointed suicidal villain keen to send thousands to their death at a moment’s trigger-happy notice… Abbott the mad monk ... lunatic ... ... incapable of being a steward of any sort ... a steroid-charged Biggles with an immolating streak ... manic ... Coups have been launched for less ...

Are these truly the standards Vice-Chancellor Martin Bean tolerates in his university? Are these the views that students are expected to accept as serious?

Prime Minister Tony Abbott today gave a national security statement that was brutally frank about the terrorism threat.
He was also a bit more frank than usual about what’s driving that threat, and certainly a lot more honest than Barack Obama.
Many of his proposals today are also perfectly reasonable - but with one major exception.The terrorism threat:

The terrorist threat is rising at home and abroad – and it’s becoming harder to combat… We have seen the beheadings, the mass executions, the crucifixions and the sexual slavery in the name of religion… We have seen our fellow Australians – people born and bred to live and let live – succumb to the lure of this death cult… And we know that this message of the most primitive savagery is being spread through the most sophisticated technology.

Last September, the National Terrorist Threat level was lifted to high, which means a terrorist attack is likely.Critics said we were exaggerating. But since then, we have witnessed the frenzied attack on two police officers in Melbourne and the horror of the Martin Place siege.Twenty people have been arrested and charged as a result of six counter terrorism operations conducted around Australia. That’s one third of all the terrorism-related arrests since 2001 – within the space of just six months…In the decade after 9/11, our agencies disrupted elaborate conspiracies to attack our electricity supplies, the Grand Final at the MCG and the Holsworthy Army Barracks in Sydney.Now, in addition to the larger scale, more complex plots that typified the post 9/11 world, such as the atrocities in Bali and London, sick individuals are acting on the caliphate’s instruction to seize people at random and kill them… They plan attacks which require little preparation, training or capability. The short lead time from the moment they decide they are going to strike, and then actually undertake the attack, makes it hard to disrupt their activities…Every single day, the Islam-ist death cult and its supporters churn out up to 100,000 social media messages in a variety of languages…Already at least 110 Australians have travelled overseas to join the death cult in Iraq and Syria… The number of Australians with hands-on terrorist experience is now several times larger than those who trained earlier in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Of that group, two-thirds became involved in terrorist activity back here in Australia. The signs are ominous. ASIO currently has over 400 high-priority counter-terrorism investigations. That’s more than double the number a year ago.

The cause (although note the wariness still about using the word “Islam” or addressing its teachings):

We have seen the beheadings, the mass executions, the crucifixions and the sexual slavery in the name of religion… Every single day, the Islamist death cult and its supporters churn out up to 100,000 social media messages in a variety of languages…

I’ve often heard Western leaders describe Islam as a ‘religion of peace’. I wish more Muslim leaders would say that more often, and mean it.I have often cited Prime Minister Najib of Malaysia, who has described the Islamist death cult as ‘against God, against Islam and against our common humanity’.In January, President al Sisi told the imams at Egypt’s al Azhar university that Islam needed a ‘religious revolution’ to sweep away centuries of false thinking.Everybody, including Muslim community leaders, needs to speak up clearly because, no matter what the grievance, violence against innocents must surely be a blasphemy against all religion.

The sensible proposals:

If Immigration and Border Protection faces a choice to let-in or keep out people with security questions over them – we should choose to keep them out… Australians who take up arms with terrorist groups, especially while Australian military personnel are engaged in Afghanistan and Iraq, have sided against their country and should be treated accordingly.For Australian nationals, we are examining suspending some of the privileges of citizenship for individuals involved in terrorism. Those could include restricting the ability to leave or return to Australia, and access to consular services overseas, as well as access to welfare payments.

Dangerous proposals:

We will also clamp down on those organisations that incite religious or racial hatred. No-one should make excuses for Islam-ist fanatics in the Middle East or their imitators here in Australia…[WARNING: Like so many Leftist academics and journalists? And does that include banning a discussion on any real grievances some might have, however appalling their actions? And won’t laws against inciting “religious hatred” be used to further stifle a legitimate and now critical debate on Islam? Our real problem here is that for too long too many on the Left, especially in the media, did not criticise Islamnic radicals and still won’t honestly critique Islam itself - a task already made too dangerous under existing vilification laws.]Organisations and individuals blatantly spreading discord and division – such as Hizb ut-Tahrir – should not do so with impunity.[WARNING: Voicing opinions should not be a crime. Such laws, we’ve seen, are already too prone to being used by activists silence genuine debate, rather than the real hate-preachers. We need more free speech, not less - and more people with the guts to use it to denounce the dividers.]Today, I can confirm that the government will be taking action against hate preachers. This includes enforcing our strengthened terrorism advocacy laws.[WAIT: We already have laws against inciting violence. Let’s be very careful about expanding such laws.]It includes new programmes to challenge terrorist propaganda and to provide alternative online material based on Australian values. And it will include stronger prohibitions on vilifying, intimidating or inciting hatred. [WAIT: More counter-propaganda sounds fine, although I doubt it will be very effective. But stronger laws against “intimidating” people are very open to abuse by activist judges. Is mere criticism potentially “intimidating”?]

And what of reckless Labor?

We’ve introduced legislation to refuse a protection visa to people who destroy evidence of their identity. And the same applies if you present a bogus document. This Bill is currently stalled in the Senate.

UPDATE
So a very serious speech about a very serious threat - one that has taken the lives of Australians already and over the past week has touched two people I know personally.
Now let’s see what some commentators, after mature reflection, add to this debate over the safety of our citizens:

ACOUSTIC expert Steven Cooper is considering launching legal action against the ABC’s Media Watch program for its portrayal of him and his research on the effect of the Pacific Hydro wind turbines on local residents. On the February 16 edition of Media Watch host Paul Barry dished out a stinging criticism of Mr Cooper’s seven-month study conducted at Cape Bridgewater in southwest Victoria — and the ­reporting of it by The Australian’s environment editor Graham Lloyd and Network Seven’s Today Tonight. However, in damning the report, the Media Watch team hand- picked a group of pro-turbine ­"experts" — with no real expertise in the field — ignored submissions from genuine acoustic experts, misrepresented Mr Cooper, ­selectively and incorrectly quoted the National Health and Medical Research Council, ignored balancing quotes in the newspaper ­reports and made a number of factual mistakes.

THE campaign to destroy Tony Abbott has become despicable. Any Liberals feeding it are not fit for high office.
Be clear: I do not blindly defend the Prime Minister.
Indeed, two weeks ago an ABC news bulletin led with the news that I’d called his decision to knight Prince Philip “pathetically stupid”.
But last week, two reports, both citing anonymous Liberal critics of Abbott, crossed the line.
The first appeared in The Age, and claimed Abbott might have cost convicted heroin smugglers Andrew Chan and Myruran Sukumaran their lives.
(Read full article here.)

The ABC sought to independently verify the report with several senior sources but no-one in the upper echelons of the Defence department could confirm it. Dennis Richardson, Secretary of the Department of Defence, slammed the story.“The report that the PM wanted to send 3,500 troops to Iraq to combat [IS] has no basis in fact,” Mr Richardson said.“Indeed the PM has never raised such a proposition formally or informally, directly or indirectly. In short it is piffle.”Another senior Defence source said: “If the Prime Minister suggested that we deploy 3,500 troops to Iraq, then the [Chief of the Defence Force], the Secretary [of the Department of Defence] or the Chief of Army would know about it.“None of those people had ever heard anything about it before it ran in the paper yesterday.”

THE revelation in The Weekend Australian that Tony Abbott may have privately canvassed the possibility of sending more than 3000 Australian troops into northern Iraq, and may have talked privately of the possibility of doing so unilaterally, reveals nothing to the Prime Minister’s discredit. It does not reveal poor judgment or foolish militarism. In terms of national security, a government must always be judged on what it does, not what thoughts it might express in private conversations when it is thinking its way through a situation…Abbott has always understood the importance of the ­Islamic State terror threat, and that this has strategic implications. He has been intellectually ahead of the game on this…Abbott offered Barack Obama assistance before the President had even decided that the US would take action against Islamic State in the Middle East. The Prime Minister did this in part to encourage the Americans to take action of their own…Everything Abbott does at the moment is interpreted in a negative light. But these revelations suggest not a foolish prime minister dreaming up quixotic adventures, but a thoughtful leader seized of his nation’s strategic interests and grappling with all the possibilities.

And what of all the news outlets - Sky News and the ABC particularly - which ran this story on high rotation all weekend even when it was plainly nonsense, unsourced and vehemently denied?
UPDATE
John Lyons in an interview with ABC TV this morning backs off his original claim that Abbott “proposed” a “unilateral invasion of Iraq”, and sought “advice” from our “top military planners”:

Lyons now says:

We said this is an idea – a suggestion – he came up with, which didn’t last very long.

More critically:

This was going to be done directly with the Government of Iraq who were reluctant anyway to have any troops on the ground.

Sending troops to a country at the invitation of its elected government can in no way be described a “unilateral invasion”.

That allegation has been denied by several ministers who were there. In an extraordinarily soft interview on Sky News tonight, Lyons concedes she was not formally the chairman, but with Abbott chairing she had used her force of personality to make requests of Ministers for information.
That suggests Lyons’ second big claim was as wrong - as wildly exaggerated - as the first.The Australian should apologise.
UPDATE
A Fairfax reporter warns of another Tony Abbott (alleged) idea:

Silly Abbott. Doesn’t he know the approved Leftist way of saving the schoolgirls? Michelle Obama demonstrates:

Why send soldiers when you can tweet your support? Job done!
(Thanks to readers John and Peter of Bellevue Hill. Thanks to reader John for correcting my post by reminding me Bourke has left the ABC and now works for Fairfax.)
Transcript:

I AM now begging Australia’s Grand Mufti, our highest ranking Muslim cleric: stop shielding extremists.
Mufti Ibrahim Abu Mohammed last week appeared in a video called Muslim Community Confronts Abbott, and made common cause with one of our most extreme Islamist groups.
This is frightening.
Most journalists insist there is a difference between moderate Muslims wanting peace and the radical jihadists who are preaching hate.
But the Mufti now destroys our work by the way he defends Hizb ut-Tahrir from the anti-terrorism plans Prime Minister Tony Abbott is expected to announce in Canberra today.
Those plans are tipped to include a crackdown on Hizb ut-Tahrir — possibly a ban.
I share the Mufti’s concerns about removing its freedom to speak, but he goes further.
(Read full article here.}

Obama’s claim that “No religion is responsible for terrorism, people are responsible for terrorism”, combined mendacity with hypocrisy. The jihadis may indeed be “madmen”, as Obama said; but to deny they act in the name of Islam is as absurd as denying the crusades were fought under the banner of Christianity.Nor was Obama on more solid ground in blaming Islamic extremism on poverty and disadvantage…On the contrary, the ringleaders of the Madrid train bombings, three of the four 7/7 bombers in London, Theo van Gogh’s assassin Muhammad Bouyeri and the medical doctors arrested in the UK’s “doctors’ plot” all seemed to be models of successful integration. And well before the Copenhagen attacks, a study of 1113 young Muslims in Denmark found that the 24 per cent who sympathised with radical Islamism, were well educated, spoke fluent Danish and had (or could have had) good jobs.Similar findings emerge from subsequent research by Johannes Kandel, who estimates that a third of Germany’s Muslim youth now hold radical Islamist views ...Islam’s revival is consequently hardly unique; but what is different is its link to religiously motivated violence…Those factors are partly inherent in scriptural Islam itself. Extremists are more likely to invoke religious authority if they can find in it support for their extremism; and the obligation of jihad, the duty to make the whole world submit to the authority of God and the belief in the restoration of the Caliphate all lend themselves to that purpose, as does Islam’s glorification of the Prophet’s exploits in battle.But what makes matters worse is that dangerous forms of those beliefs are not just held by extremists. Rather, they are widespread in Islamic communities, even in the United States, where (contrary to Obama’s assertion that America is free of Islamism) the Pew Research Centre found 8 per cent of Muslims believe suicide bombings against civilian targets can be justified…All that means the future may well bear out Samuel Huntington’s grim forecast of a “clash of civilisations”, in which religion is “a central, perhaps the central, force”. And history shows religious conflict lasts far longer, and is far more savage, than almost any other, as the calculus of costs and benefits gets drowned in the passion of belief. That is the threat the national security statement must tackle. The jihadis may well be lunatics, as Obama suggests, living and dying in a fantasy world in which they play out terrifying video games. But if so, they are, to use Marianne Moore’s phrase, “real toads in imaginary gardens”. And at the heart of those gardens lies Islam. Until we squarely face that truth, we won’t know how to deal with it.

In just the past two weeks Tony Abbott got stuck into the president of the Human Rights Commission, accusing her of political bias, threatened Indonesia not to enact its well publicised laws, which (sadly) include the death penalty, and disregarded a US court decision to overturn an unlawful terrorism conviction against David Hicks.

Gillian Triggs is indeed biased, as her handling of her inquiry amply demonstrates.
Abbott did not “threaten” Indonesia, and has denied that was his intention.
Abbott has not asked Indonesia “not to enact its ... laws”, but to grant the clemency which those laws permit.
Abbott has not “disregarded a US court decision to overturn an unlawful terrorism conviction against David Hicks”. He has in fact acknowledged and accepted it, and refuses only to apologise to David Hicks for actions taken by the Australian Government, not the US courts.
Hicks was not convicted of “terrorism” but of giving material aid to terrorists.
This is not reporting but lynching.
Oh, and “threatened Indonesia not to enact” is simply poor English, and incorrect. First, it suggests Abbott is actually threatening not to enact Indonesia’s laws, which is plainly nonsense. Second, “enact” means to make into law, not uphold a law. The phrase van Onselen wants is “threatened Indonesia if it upholds”.

Angry Indonesians have compared Tony Abbott to Shylock, the moneylender in The Merchant of Venice who demanded a pound of flesh when his rival defaulted on a loan. “Australians need a prime minister, not a Shylock and drug dealer’s cousin,” a banner said at a protest held on car-free Sunday at Jakarta’s famous Hotel Indonesia roundabout.The protest is part of a campaign to “repay” the $1 billion in Australian aid given to Indonesia after the 2004 tsunami. Mr Abbott reminded Indonesia of the donation as part of his pleas for the lives of the Bali nine duo on death row.

Abbott is a “drug dealer’s cousin”? Really? I’m guessing these activists have confused Abbott with Labor’s Tanya Plibersek, who in a brave and moving speech pleading for mercy for Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran told Parliament her husband was a completely reformed man after serving jail for drug offences. Either that, or the reporter has simply misreported the phrase “drug defender” as “drug dealer’s cousin”.
But these are the people Fairfax promotes as symbolic of the feelings of 250 million Indonesians, despite this clue:

Many people came to Sunday’s protest after learning about it from a Twitter campaign using the hashtags #KoinuntukAustralia, #coinforAustralia and #coinforAbbott.

Hmm. Normally Twitter is as representative of the public mood as a socialist rally. Even more so in Indonesia, I’d guess.
Moreover, Twitter appeals to the slackivist - all angry thumbs but no legs. And, indeed, although Fairfax refers vaguely to “many” turning up to the protest, this is all they seem to have collected of the $1 billion they claim they want to return:

The protest is in fact so small that you can’t even spot in from an aerial view of the crowds strolling around the area enjoying the car-free day:

And none of the photos suggest much more than a dozen protesters at the rally.
But a question about the Fairfax source for this story. Who in the Liberal Party is leaking and beating up false suggestions that an “unhelpful” Abbott may have cost Chan and Sukumaran their last chance of a reprieve - a reprieve that the Indonesian President has actually said repeatedly he will never give?

Foreign Minister Julie Bishop rang Vice-President Jusuf Kalla, who is understood to have said Mr Abbott’s comments were “most unhelpful”, to clarify that the Prime Minister did not mean to link tsunami aid with the executions.

UPDATE
The ABC is down to quoting anti-Abbott tweets of anonymous Indonesians. Dear God.
UPDATERita Panahi:

On top of the billions Australia has donated to Indonesia in recent years, our citizens pump millions more into the Indonesian economy. So it is perfectly reasonable to ask why we continue to give substantial sums of money to a country that consistently shows us nothing but contempt.

Once again, Labor is being rewarded for its cheap populism - a campaign against privatisation that I am certain most of its frontbenchers privately know is economic lunacy.
Oh, and watch Abbott’s enemies in the Liberal party just blame the Prime Minister instead:

PREMIER Mike Baird has a fight on his hands at the March 28 state election with his lead over Labor narrowing to 53-47 on a two-party-preferred basis in the latest Galaxy Daily Telegraph poll. The result is the worst for the state government since just after Barry O’Farrell resigned as Premier over the Grangegate affair, in which he misled the Independent Commission Against Corruption, with the same result recorded last May…The result, down from two Galaxy polls in January showing a 54-46 lead for the Coalition after a previous 56-44 poll last November, will lead to inevitable speculation the performance of Prime Minister Tony Abbott and federal Liberal troubles are contributing to poor polls…Asked if the Abbott government’s performance made people more or less likely to vote for Mike Baird, 20 per cent said more likely, 32 per cent said less likely and 41 per cent said it would not influence their vote. Showing the unpopularity of the pledge to lease 49 per cent of the electricity network to the private sector to raise $20 billion for infrastructure, more voters preferred raising taxes to pay for the projects than privatisation.

The result also shows that the Labor decision to change to Luke Foley from the unelectable John Robertson in December was correct. Foley might have come up with an unimpressive transport plan on Friday, but he is viewed as a better alternative than the ex-union leader.

It is insane, the dangers we’ve brought on ourselves with slack and wilfully naive immigration and border policies:

MORE than 30 foreign fighters have returned to Australia as the threat of terrorism continues to rise, a review of Australia’s counterterrorism co-ordination has found. There are at least 90 Australians fighting with and supporting terrorist groups in Iraq and Syria and at least 140 people in Australia supporting extremist groups.

The campaign against Credlin has become absolutely manic, and some of it’s a set-up - to first force her resignation and then blame the misogynist Abbott for scapegoating her:

PETA Credlin has decided to ­remain as Tony Abbott’s chief of staff, rejecting calls from within the Liberal Party for her resignation. Ms Credlin recently told colleagues that if she resigned it would send the wrong signal — that it would suggest she had done something wrong.The 43-year-old has become the invisible woman of Australian politics. These days she rarely ­appears in public, preferring to stay in the bunker that is her office. One of the criticisms of her by some Liberal MPs has been that her profile has been too high — and she has taken note.

Strong woman.
But I repeat that the critics need a bone - and the PM’s office likewise needs strengthening. Another very senior person needs to be put into Abbott’s office to advise on political and media strategy.

I have learned of attacks on free speech - regretfully successful in part - that have truly shocked me.
I cannot yet reveal them, given the extreme sensitivity involved. But if the public knew the full extent of the danger, there’d be a lot more than the 39 per cent in this poll:

President Viktor F. Yanukovych fled Kiev on Saturday to denounce what he called a violent coup, as his official residence, his vast, colonnaded office complex and other once impregnable centers of power fell without a fight to throngs of joyous citizens… While Mr. Yanukovych’s nemesis, former Prime Minister Yulia V. Tymoshenko, was released from a penitentiary hospital, Parliament found the president unable to fulfill his duties and exercised its constitutional powers to set an election for May 25 to select his replacement. But with both Mr. Yanukovych and his Russian patrons speaking of a “coup” carried out by “bandits” and “hooligans,” it was far from clear that the day’s lightning-quick events would be the last act in a struggle that has not just convulsed Ukraine but expanded into an East-West confrontation reminiscent of the Cold War…

A pugnacious Mr. Yanukovych appeared on television Saturday afternoon, apparently from the eastern city of Kharkiv, near Ukraine’s eastern border with Russia, saying he had been forced to leave the capital because of a “coup,"…“I don’t plan to leave the country. I don’t plan to resign,” he said, speaking in Russian rather than Ukrainian, the country’s official language....Regional governors from eastern Ukraine met in Kharkiv and adopted a resolution resisting the authority of Parliament.... Mr. Yanukovych said in his television appearance that he would be traveling to the southeastern part of Ukraine to talk to his supporters — a plan that carried potentially ominous overtones, in that the southeast is the location of the Crimea, the historically Russian section of the country that is the site of a Russian naval base.

The LNP’s former member resigned in disgrace. Labor’s candidate was strong. The LNP’s wasn’t. A sitting government is always likely to be clobbered.
But whichever way you cut it, yesterday’s result in the Redcliffe byelection was still bad for the Newman Government:

While he said the spectre of disgraced former MP Scott Driscoll loomed large over the result, Mr Newman took some responsibility for the massive swing against the Liberal National Party.With all booths reporting back on Saturday night, ... there was a 16.3 per cent two party preferred swing against the LNP and its candidate, former Family First candidate Kerri-Anne Dooley.

Across town at the Redcliffe Leagues Club, a victorious Yvette D’Ath claimed victory for the Labor Party, thus increasing their parliamentary stocks from seven to eight.... Ms D’Ath, the former federal MP who lost the seat of Petrie in last year’s election, said she wanted to “fix the damage this LNP government has done to this community” ...

The Newman Government seems to have been rocked repeatedly by the consequences of having had inadequate or poorly vetted candidates elected as MPs. A note for the future.
And once again I must ask why the Left is so prone to abuse:

The writing was on the wall for the LNP early on Saturday when the Premier visited a polling booth at Humpybong State School, where Ms Dooley, who was ineligible to vote herself, had just accompanied her parents to the polling station. Mr Newman faced a hostile reception from unionists, Labor Party members and other protesters, who all subjected him to a barrage of abuse.

UPDATE
Good point from Gerard Henderson today: the big swing to Labor in the Redcliffe by-election makes even more remarkable the swing to the Abbott Government in the Griffith by-election.

Confirming Australia had sent more than 100 private security officers to Manus since last week’s riots that killed one man and injured 77, Mr Morrison said the possibility of closure was only a “hypothetical”. Asked if Manus Island was a safe environment he said that was what the contract paid local staff to ensure. “When people have taken it upon themselves to rip fences down and try and wreck the joint, well, they are going to put themselves at the risk of how people respond,” he told The Sunday Telegraph.

The Australian government has asked Cambodia to accept refugees seeking asylum in a move similar to the former Labor government’s so-called ‘’Malaysian solution’’… When they were in opposition, Coalition MPs were strongly critical of Labor’s attempt to send asylum seekers to Malaysia in 2011.

That first sentence is not true, because the proposal - as the very same Fairfax article explains - omits the controversial element of the Malaysian people swap:

Cambodian Foreign Minister Hor Nam Hong said the request was made on Saturday morning during a meeting between his Australian counterpart Julie Bishop and the Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen. ‘’In the past, there have been Cambodians going out as refugees to different countries. Now perhaps it is time for Cambodia to receive refugees back to Cambodia,’’ Mr Hor Nam Hong told journalists after a press briefing, adding the number of refugees had not been decided but this would depend on Australia… ‘’But my Prime Minister and myself this morning have told Australia that Cambodia will consider very seriously the request of Australia because before there were many Cambodians seeking asylum outside of Cambodia through the war but now maybe it is the time for Cambodia to accept some of the foreign refugees in Cambodia.’’

Reader Peter of Bellevue Hill notes the obvious inaccuracy:

Nowhere in the story does it suggest Australia and Cambodia would be ‘swapping’ asylum seekers - which means the arrangement would be nothing like the Malaysia Solution. It was the ‘swap’ element that made the Malaysia Solution a reprehensible concept.

In paragraph 21 of the Complaint, Mann claimed that there had been “separate and independent” investigations by Penn State and UEA (two each) and by five government agencies into misconduct by “Mann and colleagues” and that all nine found no basis to allegations of “scientific misconduct or manipulation of data”:

21. Following the publication of the CRU [Climatic Research Unit of the University of East Anglia] emails, Penn State and the University of East Anglia (in four separate instances) and five governmental agencies [listed] have conducted separate and independent investigations into the allegations of scientific misconduct against Dr. Mann and his colleagues. Every one of these investigations has reached the same conclusion: there is no basis to any of the allegations of scientific misconduct or manipulation of data.

The Report of the International Panel assessed the integrity of the research published by the CRU and found “no evidence of any deliberate scientific malpractice in any of the work of the Climatic Research Unit”.

In fact, says McIntyre, the Oxburgh report did not examine Mann and his infamous “hockey stick” (showing unprecedented warming) in any detail, yet still included criticisms of him:

Oxburgh and his “Scientific Appraisal Panel” ... interpreted its terms of reference as the examination of a list of 11 academic articles selected by the University of East Anglia… The list included three CRU articles presenting variations of the Briffa MXD reconstruction [of tree ring data] that had originated the hide-the-decline controversy. Two of the three articles – both from 1998 – unambiguously showed the decline [in temperatures] in the Briffa reconstruction. (Indeed, it was the inconsistency between these articles and the IPCC diagram that had originally occasioned my interest.) However, both these articles were prior to the unsavory discussion among Mann and other IPCC authors in which senior IPCC officials expressed their concern that inclusion of the Briffa reconstruction [showing a later cooling, not warming] might “dilute the message”, with Mann readily acquiescing because he did not want to give “fodder to the skeptics"… CRU later sent Mann a version in which data was deleted after 1960....The Oxburgh panel had only the following short report on these issues:

7. Recent public discussion of climate change and summaries and popularizations of the work of CRU and others often contain oversimplifications that omit serious discussion of uncertainties emphasized by the original authors. For example, CRU publications repeatedly emphasize the discrepancy between instrumental and tree-based proxy reconstructions of temperature during the late 20th century, but presentations of this work by the IPCC and others have sometimes neglected to highlight this issue. While we find this regrettable, we could find no such fault with the peer-reviewed papers we examined.

Oxburgh obviously did not respond to actual criticism, which was of the IPCC diagram [the “hockey stick” prepared by Mann showing runaway warming]… The Climategate emails obviously shed a very unsavory light on the decision to delete adverse data in IPCC TAR. The Oxburgh panel considered the IPCC diagram only in passing, but its finds were all adverse to Mann. They described IPCC’s failure (in Mann’s section) to highlight the discrepancy as negligent and “regrettable”.

But at a press conference to discuss the Oxburgh findings, panel member Professor David Hand went much further in criticising Mann, as the Daily Telegraph reported at the time:

Professor David Hand said that the research – led by US scientist Michael Mann – would have shown less dramatic results if more reliable techniques had been used to analyse the data… But the reviewers found that the scientists could have used better statistical methods in analysing some of their data, although it was unlikely to have made much difference to their results. That was not the case with some previous climate change reports, where ”inappropriate methods” had exaggerated the global warming phenomenon. Prof Hand singled out a 1998 paper by Prof Mann of Pennsylvania State University, a constant target for climate change sceptics, as an example of this. He said the graph, that showed global temperature records going back 1,000 years, was exaggerated – although any reproduction using improved techniques is likely to also show a sharp rise in global warming. He agreed the graph would be more like a field hockey stick than the ice hockey blade it was originally compared to. “The particular technique they used exaggerated the size of the blade at the end of the hockey stick. Had they used an appropriate technique the size of the blade of the hockey stick would have been smaller,” he said. ”The change in temperature is not as great over the 20th century compared to the past as suggested by the Mann paper.”

In my most recent post, I showed that Mann’s claim to have been “exonerated” by the Oxburgh inquiry had no more validity than Mann’s claim to have won a Nobel prize.... Mann’s claim to have been “exonerated” by the Muir Russell inquiry is equally invalid. In their memoranda supporting their original motions to dismiss, both National Review and CEI had observed (correctly) that the Muir Russell panel had limited their findings to “CRU scientists” and contested Mann’s assertion that the Muir Russell panel had made any findings regarding Mann himself, let alone “exonerated” him.In Mann’s Reply Memorandum, he vociferously rejected the (correct) assertion that the Muir Russell had not exonerated Mann himself… Mann supported this bluster with an apparent quotation from the Muir Russell report, but the phrase within the quotation marks does not actually occur within the Muir Russell report. As shown below, Mann and/or his lawyers subtly altered the quotation to more supportive language.....Mann purported to provide the requested supporting quotation from the Muir Russell report showing that the supposed exoneration was not limited to “CRU scientists”, but extended more generally to “the scientists”, including Mann himself:

Three months later, the University of East Anglia published the Independent Climate Change Email Review report, prepared under the oversight of Sir Muir Russell. The report examined whether manipulation or suppression of data occurred and concluded that ”the scientists’ rigor and honesty are not in doubt. (my bold)(38 – Muir Russell Report)”

On the specific allegations made against the behaviour of CRU scientists, we find that their rigour and honesty as scientists are not in doubt.

Had Mann’s Reply Memorandum provided the actual quotation, it would have confirmed National Review’s and CEI’s claim that the Muir Russell had confined its findings to “CRU scientists”, but not in the quotation as altered by Mann and/or his lawyers.

And note how Mann and/or his lawyers even changed the spelling of “rigour” in purporting to quote from the report.
McIntyre pomises more revelations to explode Mann’s claims he was “exonerated”.

Immigration Minister Scott Morrison admits he was misled about the Manus Island riot - misled, I’d add, in a very serious way:

I wish to confirm that contrary to initial reports received, I have received further information that indicates that the majority of the riotous behaviour that occurred, and the response to that behaviour to restore order to the centre, took place within the perimeter of the centre. As advised on the afternoon of Tuesday February 18, I indicated that I had received further information which meant that I could no longer confirm that the deceased man sustained his injuries outside the centre. The further information I have now received casts further doubt on the initial advice that his injuries were sustained outside the centre.

I find it hard to believe that whoever assured Morrison or his staff that most injuries were suffered outside the centre was not lying. It’s no longer possible to believe other assurances now, including claims there was no evidence of anyone having their throat cut.
My confidence in the information given to date by the Government on this riot is now extremely low.
There is now an independent investigation, but I’d like some interim signs that the guilty are being removed and any suspect staff urgently replaced.

2007 – A train derails on an evening express service near Grayrigg, Cumbria, England, killing one person and injuring 88. This results in hundreds of points being checked over the UK after a few similar accidents.

“There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.” - 1 John 4:18

===

Morning and Evening by Charles Spurgeon

February 22: Morning

"His bow abode in strength, and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob." -Genesis 49:24

That strength which God gives to his Josephs is real strength; it is not a boasted valour, a fiction, a thing of which men talk, but which ends in smoke; it is true--divine strength. Why does Joseph stand against temptation? Because God gives him aid. There is nought that we can do without the power of God. All true strength comes from "the mighty God of Jacob." Notice in what a blessedly familiar way God gives this strength to Joseph--"The arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob." Thus God is represented as putting his hands on Joseph's hands, placing his arms on Joseph's arms. Like as a father teaches his children, so the Lord teaches them that fear him. He puts his arms upon them. Marvellous condescension! God Almighty, Eternal, Omnipotent, stoops from his throne and lays his hand upon the child's hand, stretching his arm upon the arm of Joseph, that he may be made strong! This strength was also covenant strength, for it is ascribed to "the mighty God of Jacob." Now, wherever you read of the God of Jacob in the Bible, you should remember the covenant with Jacob. Christians love to think of God's covenant. All the power, all the grace, all the blessings, all the mercies, all the comforts, all the things we have, flow to us from the well-head, through the covenant. If there were no covenant, then we should fail indeed; for all grace proceeds from it, as light and heat from the sun. No angels ascend or descend, save upon that ladder which Jacob saw, at the top of which stood a covenant God. Christian, it may be that the archers have sorely grieved you, and shot at you, and wounded you, but still your bow abides in strength; be sure, then, to ascribe all the glory to Jacob's God.

Jehovah "is slow to anger." When mercy cometh into the world she driveth winged steeds; the axles of her chariot-wheels are red hot with speed; but when wrath goeth forth, it toileth on with tardy footsteps, for God taketh no pleasure in the sinner's death. God's rod of mercy is ever in his hands outstretched; his sword of justice is in its scabbard, held down by that pierced hand of love which bled for the sins of men. "The Lord is slow to anger," because he is great in power. He is truly great in power who hath power over himself. When God's power doth restrain himself, then it is power indeed: the power that binds omnipotence is omnipotence surpassed. A man who has a strong mind can bear to be insulted long, and only resents the wrong when a sense of right demands his action. The weak mind is irritated at a little: the strong mind bears it like a rock which moveth not, though a thousand breakers dash upon it, and cast their pitiful malice in spray upon its summit. God marketh his enemies, and yet he bestirs not himself, but holdeth in his anger. If he were less divine than he is, he would long ere this have sent forth the whole of his thunders, and emptied the magazines of heaven; he would long ere this have blasted the earth with the wondrous fires of its lower regions, and man would have been utterly destroyed; but the greatness of his power brings us mercy. Dear reader, what is your state this evening? Can you by humble faith look to Jesus, and say, "My substitute, thou art my rock, my trust"? Then, beloved, be not afraid of God's power; for by faith you have fled to Christ for refuge, the power of God need no more terrify you, than the shield and sword of the warrior need terrify those whom he loves. Rather rejoice that he who is "great in power" is your Father and Friend.

Today's reading: Numbers 3-4, Mark 3:20-35 (NIV)

The Levites

1 This is the account of the family of Aaron and Moses at the time the LORD spoke to Moses at Mount Sinai.

2 The names of the sons of Aaron were Nadab the firstborn and Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar. 3 Those were the names of Aaron's sons, the anointed priests, who were ordained to serve as priests. 4 Nadab and Abihu, however, died before the LORD when they made an offering with unauthorized fire before him in the Desert of Sinai. They had no sons, so Eleazar and Ithamar served as priests during the lifetime of their father Aaron....

Jesus Accused by His Family and by Teachers of the Law

20 Then Jesus entered a house, and again a crowd gathered, so that he and his disciples were not even able to eat. 21 When his family heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, "He is out of his mind."

22 And the teachers of the law who came down from Jerusalem said, "He is possessed by Beelzebul! By the prince of demons he is driving out demons...."

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About Me

I'm author of History in a Year by the Conservative Voice aka History of the World in a Year by the Conservative Voice.

I'm the Conservative Voice.

I'm looking to make contact with those who might use my skill.

I have an m-audio mobile pre amp fed by the audiotechnica 2041sp condensor mic pack. Prior to 15/4/06, I'd used a Shure sm-58 that required a nuclear blast to register a sound or the internal mic of my aged imac, which has a penchance to recording my breathing. I also used a Griffin itrip, until the community convinced me it was not hiding my talent as well as the other mics.

I am a Writer and an occasional Math Teacher (Sir, what's the occasion?). I like to sing, having no instrumental talent (cannot even clap in time, and yes, I'm aware singing badly IS obnoxious).

I have performed the finale to Les Miserables before an audience of 500. I have also sung before a similar audience (students, parents) renditions of 'I Will' (Beatles), 'Mr Cairo' (Jon Vangelis) and 'I am Australian' (Seekers). Now I seek another profession because the audience hates me ..